Come Ye Children: Obtaining Our Lord's Heart for Loving and Teaching Children

By Charles H. Spurgeon

Teaching children things of the Lord is an honor and a high calling. Children have boundless energy and may appear distracted, but they are capable of understanding biblical truths even adults have a hard time grasping. Children's minds are easily impressed with new thoughts, whether good or bad, and will remember many of their young lessons for the rest of their life. Adults and churches tend to provide entertainment to occupy the children, but children ought to have our undivided attention. Jesus said, let the little children come to me. They were worthy of His time and devotion, and they are worthy of ours.

Expect to be challenged and inspired as you read this classic from Charles H. Spurgeon. Learn how to enlarge your heart for all types of children, learn what lessons are best, and learn what results to expect. May this helpful little book be the catalyst for many new or improved shepherds of the Lord's lambs.

About the Author
Charles Haddon (C. H.) Spurgeon (1834-1892) was a British Baptist preacher. He started preaching at age 17 and quickly became famous. He is still known as the “Prince of Preachers,” and frequently had more than 10,000 people present to hear him preach at the Metropolitan Tabernacle in London. His sermons were printed in newspapers, translated into many languages, and published in many books.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Aneko Press
• Release date: Mar 1, 2018
• ISBN: 9781622455270

Charles H. Spurgeon

Charles H. Spurgeon (1834-1892), nació en Inglaterra, y fue un predicador bautista que se mantuvo muy influyente entre cristianos de diferentes denominaciones, los cuales todavía lo conocen como «El príncipe de los predicadores». El predicó su primer sermón en 1851 a los dieciséis años y paso a ser pastor de la iglesia en Waterbeach en 1852. Publicó más de 1.900 sermones y predicó a 10.000,000 de personas durante su vida. Además, Spurgeon fue autor prolífico de una variedad de obras, incluyendo una autobiografía, un comentario bíblico, libros acerca de la oración, un devocional, una revista, poesía, himnos y más. Muchos de sus sermones fueron escritos mientras él los predicaba y luego fueron traducidos a varios idiomas. Sin duda, ningún otro autor, cristiano o de otra clase, tiene más material impreso que C.H. Spurgeon.

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Come Ye Children

Obtaining Our Lord’s Heart for Loving and Teaching Children

Charles H. Spurgeon

Contents

Ch. 1: Feed My Lambs

Ch. 2: Let the Children Come

Ch. 3: Children Desperately Need the Lord

Ch. 4: The Children’s Shepherd

Ch. 5: Of Such is the Kingdom of Heaven

Ch. 6: The Fertile Ground of a Child’s Heart

Ch. 7: Teach the Children

Ch. 8: Timothy and His Teachers

Ch. 9: Look at Everything Through the Cross

Ch. 10: Samuel and His Teachers

Ch. 11: Instructions for Teachers and Parents

Ch. 12: Be an Upright Example for Children

Ch. 13: Always Remember These Three Things

Ch. 14: Children’s Capacity to Believe

Ch. 15: Not Just a Sunday School Teacher

Ch. 16: Children Can Understand the Bible

Ch. 17: The Sooner the Better

Ch. 18: Obadiah’s Early Faithfulness

Ch. 19: Obadiah and Elijah

Ch. 20: Some Good Thing – Part 1

Ch. 21: Some Good Thing – Part 2

Ch. 22: The Shunammite’s Son – Part 1

Ch. 23: The Shunammite’s Son – Part 2

About the Author

Chapter 1

Feed My Lambs

The most mature and educated in the church are not too good or unsuited for this work. We must not think that because we have other services to do or gifts to share that we should not take an interest in this holy work. But in all kindness and according to our opportunities, we must stand ready to help the little ones and to cheer those whose chief calling is to minister to them. This message comes to all of us: Feed my lambs (John 21:15). To the minister and to all who have any knowledge of the things of God, the commission is given. Be certain to look after the children who are in Christ Jesus, for even Peter, who was a leader among believers, was told to feed the lambs.

The lambs are the young of the flock. So, we ought to look especially and carefully after those who are young in grace. They may be old in years, but they may still be mere babes in grace with respect to their spiritual life; therefore, they need to be under a good shepherd. As soon as a person is converted and added to the church, he should become the object of the care and kindness of his fellow members. He is a newcomer among us and has no familiar friends among the saints; therefore, let us all be friendly to him. Even if we must leave our older comrades, we need to be doubly kind towards those who have recently escaped from the world and have come to find a refuge with the Almighty and His people.

Watch with continuous care over those newborn babes who are strong in desires but weak in everything else. They have just crept out of darkness, and their eyes can scarcely bear the light; let us shade them until they grow accustomed to the blaze of gospel daylight. We need to addict ourselves to the holy work of caring for the feeble and despondent. Peter himself must have felt like a newly enlisted soldier who had ended his public Christian life by denying his Lord, but he began it again when he went out and wept bitterly (Matthew 26:75). He made a new confession of his faith before his Lord and his brothers, and because he could sympathize with new believers, he was commissioned to act as a guardian to them.

Young converts are too timid to ask for our help, so our Lord introduces them to us, and with an emphatic command, He says, Feed my lambs. Jesus further explains what this means: Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brothers, ye have done it unto me (Matthew 25:40).

However young a believer may be, he should make an open confession of his faith and be embraced by the rest of the flock of Christ. We are not suspicious of youthful confessions of faith; we could never see more reason for suspicions of the young than of those who repent late in life. Of the two, we think the latter are to be questioned more than the former, for a selfish fear of punishment and dread of death are more likely to produce a counterfeit faith than mere childish innocence would. How much the child has missed which might have spoiled it! How much does the child not know, which we hope he may never know! Oh, how much there is of brightness and trustfulness in children when they are converted to God that we do not see in older converts!

Our Lord Jesus evidently felt deep sympathy for children, but the person who looks upon them as a trouble in the world and treats them as if they must be either little deceivers or foolish simpletons is not like Christ. To you who teach in our schools is given this joyous privilege of finding out where these young disciples are who are truly the lambs of Christ’s flock, and to you He says, Feed my lambs; that is, instruct those who are truly gracious but young in years.

Remarkably, the word used here for Feed my lambs is different from the word employed in Feed my sheep. I will not trouble you with Greek words, but the second feed means to exercise the office of a shepherd, rule, regulate, lead, manage, and do all that a shepherd does towards a flock. But the first feed does not include all of this; it only means to feed, and it directs teachers to a duty which they may neglect – namely, that of instructing children in the faith.

The lambs do not need to be kept in order as much as we do, who know so much and yet know so little that we think we are so far advanced that we can judge one another and contend and imitate. Christian children mainly need to be taught the doctrines, precepts, and life of the gospel; they require divine truth to be put before them clearly and forcibly. Why should the higher doctrines, the doctrines of grace, be kept back from them? These doctrines are not merely structural bones; or if they are, they are full of marrow and covered with fatness. If there is any doctrine too difficult for a child, the fault is the teacher’s conception of it rather than the child’s ability to receive it, provided the child is really converted to God. Our responsibility is to make doctrine simple; this is a main part of our work. Teach the little ones the whole truth and nothing but the truth, for instruction is the great desire of the child’s nature.

A child not only lives as you and I do but also needs to grow; hence, he has double need of food. When speaking of their boys, fathers say, What appetites they have! They should remember that we would also have great appetites if we not only had to keep the machinery going but also had to enlarge it at the same time. Children have to grow in grace – rising to greater capacity in knowing, being, doing, and feeling, and to greater power from God.

Therefore, above all things they must be fed. They must be fed well or instructed, because they are in danger of having their cravings perversely satisfied with error. Youth are susceptible to evil doctrine. Whether we teach young Christians truth or not, the devil will be sure to teach them error. They will hear it somehow, even if they are watched by the most careful guardians. The only way to keep chaff out of the child’s little measure is to fill it to the brim with good wheat. Oh, may the spirit of God help us do this! The more the young are taught, the better; truth will keep them from being misled.

We are especially exhorted to feed them, because they are likely to be overlooked. I am afraid our sermons often go over the heads of the young – who may be as true Christians as the older ones. Blessed is he who can speak in a way that is understood by a child! Blessed is that godly woman who adapts herself in her class to the style of youthful thought so that the truth from her heart streams into the children’s hearts without limitation or hindrance.

We are also exhorted to feed the young, because this work is so profitable. Try as we may with persons converted late in life, their years of service are limited. We rejoice for their own sakes, but at seventy, what remains even if they live another ten years? Train up a child, and he may have fifty years of holy service in the future. We are glad to welcome those who come into the vineyard at the eleventh hour, but they have hardly begun with their pruning hook and their spade before the sun goes down, and their short day’s work is ended. The time spent in training the late convert is greater than the time reserved for his actual service.

But if you teach a child convert well, early devotion often becomes greater devotion, and that greater devotion may have many years in which God may be glorified and others may be blessed. Such work is profitable in a high degree. It is also most beneficial work for us, because it exercises our humility, keeps us lowly and meek, and trains our patience. Let those who doubt this try it, for even young Christians exercise the patience of those who believe in them and are therefore anxious to justify their confidence. If you want big-souled, large-hearted men or women, look for them among those who are engaged with the young, bearing with their foolishness and sympathizing with their weaknesses for Jesus’s sake.

Chapter 2

Let the Children Come

Concerning the hindering of children, we see the results of this tendency in the fact that often the service offers nothing for the children. The sermon is over their heads, and the preacher does not think this is his fault. In fact, he often rejoices in this. Some time ago, a person who seemed to want to make me feel my own insignificance wrote to say that he had met with a number of simple people who had read my sermons with evident pleasure; he continued to say that he believed the sermons were very suitable for these simple people. Yes, my preaching was just the sort of stuff for the simple. The gentleman could not imagine what sincere pleasure he caused me, for if I am understood by poor people, by uneducated servants, and by children, I am sure I can be understood by others.

I am anxious to preach for simpletons, if by these, you mean the lowest and the ragtag. There is nothing greater than to win the hearts of the lowly and the children. People occasionally say of such a preacher, He is only fit to teach children; he is no preacher. I tell you, in God’s sight, he is no preacher who does not care for the children. At least part of every sermon and service should suit the little ones. Only error permits us to forget this.

Parents sin in the same way when they omit religion from the education of their children. Perhaps they think their children cannot be converted while they are children, so they don’t think it matters where the children go to school in their tender years. But this is not so. Many parents even forget this when their girls and boys are finishing their early school days. They send them away to